basicdez has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Okay, say this is basicdez.dat file. 
"PER"
"Denise Johnson" "red,orange,yellow,green,blue,purple" 09/25/2001
"EOS"

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And this is the desired outcome... 

Name  = Denise Johnson
Color = red
Color = orange
Color = yellow
Color = green
Color = blue
Color = purple
Date  = 09/25/2001

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How could I change this code to read in the colors as an array. I do not want this... 
Name  = Denise Johnson
Color = red,orange,yellow,green,blue,purple
Date  = 09/25/2001

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And I do not want this, which is what this code currently produces... 
Name   = PER
Color  =
Date   =
Name   = Denise Johnson
Color  = red,orange,yellow,green,blue,purple
Date   = 09/25/2001

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I would like to take the colors in as a comma delimitted field and produce them out as individual fields. Please help me if you can. peace dez L Current Code (It really needs some help) 
#!/usr/bin/perl-Tw
use strict;

use Text::ParseWords;
open(DATA,"basicdez.dat") || die "Cannot open datfile: $!\n";
my @data;
my $i = 0;

while (<DATA>)
{
  chomp;
  last if /^"EOS"$/;
  {
  @data = &quotewords('\s+', 0, $_);
  }
   print "Name   = $data[0]\n";
   print "Color  = $data[1]\n";
   print "Date   = $data[2]\n";
}

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I know that this does not come close, but please help me out if you can... What I really need help with is seperating out the comma dilemmeted field. Any suggestions would be awesome... dez L

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Comma Delimitted Fields..
by thatguy (Parson) on Oct 18, 2001 at 23:53 UTC
    split the color field ($data[1]) into an array and the print the colors like so:
    #!/usr/bin/perl-Tw
use strict;

use Text::ParseWords;
open(DATA,"basicdez.dat") || die "Cannot open datfile: $!\n";
my @data;
my $i = 0;

while (<DATA>)
{
  chomp;
  last if /^"EOS"$/;
  {
  @data = &quotewords('\s+', 0, $_);
  }
      # if all fields exist (gets rid of PER issue)
   if (($data[0]) && ($data[1]) && ($data[2])) {
      my @colors=split(/,/, $data[1]);
      print "Name   = $data[0]\n";
      for (@colors){
         # print each color
         print "Color  = $_\n";
      }
      print "Date   = $data[2]\n";
   }
}

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    -phill
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      Two small remarks: 

      • for (@colors){
  print "Color  = $_\n";
}

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        can lead to nasty surprises as you are overwriting $_ of the while loop. So either add local $_; before the loop or use a loop variable 
        for my $color (@colors){
  print "Color  = $color\n";
}

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      • if (($data[0]) && ($data[1]) && ($data[2])) {
        is quite restrictive. This doesn't allow for empty fields or lines without date. Alternatives would be if (@data == 3) or the next if suggestion by dragonchild. Of course, basicdez has to specify himself which of the alternatives fits his requirements.

      -- Hofmator

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Re: Comma Delimitted Fields..
by Masem (Monsignor) on Oct 18, 2001 at 23:54 UTC
    You're close: what you need to do is now split the second data field $data[1] into several parts, preferably with the split function: 
    # instead of print "Color =" above, ....

foreach my $color ( split /,/ $data[1] ) {
   print "Color = $color\n";
}

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    -----------------------------------------------------
    Dr. Michael K. Neylon - mneylon-pm@masemware.com || "You've left the lens cap of your mind on again, Pinky" - The Brain
    "I can see my house from here!"
    It's not what you know, but knowing how to find it if you don't know that's important

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Re: Comma Delimitted Fields..
by scain (Curate) on Oct 19, 2001 at 00:01 UTC
    I imiagine there is more that one way, but assuming PER is a record delimiter, you need to check if you have hit a delimiter and then start grabbing data. I would wonder though if all of your records look like this (ie, all on one line) why do you need a delimiter?

    Anyway, assuming you do need the delimiter: 

    /usr/bin/perl-Tw
use strict;

use Text::ParseWords;
open(DATA,"basicdez.dat") || die "Cannot open datfile: $!\n";
my @data;
my $i = 0;
my $new_record=0;
while (<DATA>)
{
  chomp;
  last if /^"EOS"$/;
  if (/^PER\s*$/) {
     $new_record=1;
  }
  elsif ($new_record) {
     @data = &quotewords('\s+', 0, $_);

     print "Name   = $data[0]\n";
     print "Color  = $data[1]\n";
     print "Date   = $data[2]\n";

     $new_record = 0;
  } 
}

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Re: Comma Delimitted Fields..
by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Oct 19, 2001 at 00:01 UTC
    Others have already answered your Color question. I'll address your other, unspoken question. Add the following line after the last 
        next if /^"PER"$/;

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    That will skip the 'PER' line. :-)

    ------
    We are the carpenters and bricklayers of the Information Age.

    Don't go borrowing trouble. For programmers, this means Worry only about what you need to implement.

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